The Crack of Dawn

Volume #60

8/2/22

Newsletter60

The Crack of Dawn

I open my shade and it’s the Dead of Night (1945), which has a seriously scary sequence with Michael Redgrave as a ventriloquist.

New movies used to open on Wednesdays and Fridays.  In high school I would skip school every Wednesday, hitchhike to the movie theater and see a new movie.  On Dec. 18, 1974, I went to the Northland Theater, a 2,000-seat house, and saw the very first matinee showing of The Godfather Part II.  I was the only person there.  I watched the film and thought, “This is the best movie I’ve ever seen in my life.”  When I came out of the theater, three hours and twenty minutes later, there was a line of people around the building.  I lit a cigarette and thought, “For this brief moment, I’m the only person in Michigan who has seen this film, and it belongs to me.”

Let’s see how briefly I can tell this story.  The prettiest girl on the Evil Dead 2 crew was the assistant art director, Elizabeth.  I asked her out and she said, “I’m art directing the Wilshire Theater for a tribute to some guy named Nunnally Johnson, ever heard of him?”  I said, “Nunnally Johnson wrote the script and produced The Grapes of Wrath.  He wrote, produced and directed How to Marry a Millionaire with Marilyn Monroe.  Yes, I’ve heard of him.”  Elizabeth was impressed, so that was good.  I arrived early and the interior of the theater was beautifully decorated in a black and white Art Deco style.  Elizabeth walked up in a stunning, tight, black and white dress, and though still beautiful, she looked beat.  She said that she’d worked straight through since yesterday morning and had been up all night.  She gave me my ticket, said she had some last minute fixes, and would meet me in the theater.  It was a full house of the most glamorous people in Hollywood.  The only empty seat was next to me.  People sitting around me began to humorously give me shit, saying, “Stood up?”  Lauren Bacall was the host.  She announced the guests: Bette Davis, Charlton Heston, Paul Newman, Joanne Woodward, Gregory Peck, Lee Marvin, Doris Day . . .  Elizabeth dropped into the seat beside me, wiped out.  I looked around at the friendly folks who had kidded me and all of them smiled and nodded, saying, “She’s so beautiful she was definitely worth waiting for.”  I grinned.  I was in the proverbial cat-bird seat.  I’d made it; this was it; I was amongst my peers with the most attractive woman in the place.  Just as Lauren Bacall introduced Bette Davis, Elizabeth’s head dropped over onto my shoulder, fast asleep.  Oh well, she didn’t know who Nunnally Johnson was anyway.  And then Elizabeth began to snore, loud.  I shook her, she awoke and sat up, blinking her eyes.  As Bette Davis took the stage, Elizabeth’s head once again dropped onto my shoulder, and once again she began to snore really loud.  Ridiculously loud.  I shook her again.  She woke up, looked around the theater, turned to me and said, “I have to go home and sleep right now.”  The irony was not lost on me as I helped Elizabeth to her feet and escorted her out of the theater.  I glanced over my shoulder and saw Bette Davis step up to the podium, and just begin to speak as we left.  Unsurprisingly, after a few more dates, Elizabeth and I parted ways.

As the sky begins to lighten, a silhouette of trees appears, creating a foreground.